What can you learn from a head of lettuce? Apparently, more than I expected.
I was making myself a sandwich and pulled a fresh head of lettuce out of the refrigerator. From the outside, it looked perfectly fine. But when I peeled back the first layer, there were little bugs all over it. I pulled back another layer, and there were more.
At that point, I had pretty much lost my appetite for lettuce.
The whole thing went into the trash, and what got me was how normal it had looked from the outside. You would never have known what was hiding underneath those leaves.
When I told Caryn about it, she connected it to something Jesus said in Matthew 23:27: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees! You hypocrites! You’re like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness.”
Jesus was talking to people who knew how to look righteous on the outside while something very different was happening in their hearts. They cared about appearances, but God was looking deeper.
That hits a little closer to home than I’d like sometimes. I can look like I’ve got things together while still wrestling with fear, selfishness, pride, doubt, or something else nobody else can see.
Following Jesus is not just about looking right on the outside. It is about letting Him work in the hidden places too.